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Buchanan Ingersoll PC is one of the nation's largest law firms with over 965 active employees in 13 locations. The firm's attorneys are experienced in a variety of different industries and support both national and international clients. With more than 150 years of expertise, Buchanan Ingersoll continues to expand into law markets.

In favor of iVantage®

Buchanan Ingersoll initially licensed SPECTRUM's desktop-based system, HRVantage®, in 1995. Over the years, the firm opened several offices across the country. With their expansion, they needed to switch to a web-based Human Resource Information System (HRIS) in order to connect all of their HR information into one centralized system that could be accessed anywhere via the Internet.

They knew a HRIS would allow them to easily update information and communicate with their employees via the web. iVantage gave them the power to do this, while letting them track specific information pertaining to their attorneys.

With a positive working relationship already in progress, Buchanan Ingersoll upgraded to iVantage because they were confident SPECTRUM's HRIS would accommodate all of their HR system needs.

"The iVantage system is a powerful system because all of our data, both current and historical, is consolidated in one centralized area," says Stephen Ferber, Director of Human Resources.

Proven law functionality

Buchanan Ingersoll selected iVantage with a standard system tailoring package for law firms. This package allows the firm to track and generate reports about their attorneys' credentials and state certifications, and analyze their secretary pairing - while still tracking core HR information such as benefits, absences, performance reviews, and training and development.

Among iVantage's many legal functionality pieces, there is a secretary pairing task. This allows users to see which attorney is paired up with whom, and helps to identify alternative support staff. Additionally, a practice management history task allows a user to input an attorney's major practice group and other practice areas the attorney specializes in. This enables Buchanan Ingersoll to quickly pull a report to see which attorneys are qualified to work on specific projects. The system can also track bar memberships and enable users to view who is qualified to practice law in specific states.

"There are several legal-specific fields, including law school class and graduation year, that we needed to track. iVantage makes it easy for us to tailor specific fields and create subsequent reports," Ferber said.

The system is also tailored to add specific employee location information, such as the floor and architectural number, which are used to map employee offices. Additionally, fields such as Do Not Publish, Do Not Publish Mobile, and Unlisted Number were added to the system to protect the privacy of their employees’ personal information.

Ferber sent the IT staff to a iVantage Customization training class, which has proved to be a big benefit for the firm. "iVantage has been so easy for us to customize for these and many other needed fields and subsequent reporting," Ferber said.

The last major item the iVantage system addressed was creating customized reports. "The iVantage system stores statistical information electronically," Ferber said. "We can easily pull data from this centralized storage area to run our reports."

Features like Ad Hoc Reports can be accessed within the system to create a Crystal Report. This helps Ferber and his team produce valuable, customized reports. Both managers and HR have the ability to run analysis on data and produce reports in minutes.

iVantage wins the verdict

As a leading law firm, Buchanan Ingersoll knows what it takes win a case! By switching to iVantage, they continue to meet and exceed the expectations of their attorneys, managers and employees at multiple locations. Ferber and his team are confident the iVantage system will continue to meet their current and future needs.

"SPECTRUM has met all of our needs," Ferber said. "Their systems are user friendly, and we’re very pleased with the support we’ve received from their team."